As presented to the county Board of Commissioners Nov. 15 by Jennifer Teague, Buncombe’s aging and adult services program manager, the Asheville-Buncombe County Homeless Coalition called the first Code Purple of 2022 on Oct. 15 — the first day this year’s program went into effect. After evaluating the results of that first night, the coalition decided to extend entry times for Code Purple shelters.
The Community Reparations Commission, tasked with developing recommendations for Asheville and Buncombe County to address the impacts of systemic racism, currently consists of 25 members and seven alternates but has no youth representation.
The Buncombe County Board of Commissioners awarded over $11 million in federal COVID-19 recovery funding Nov. 16. Those grants did not include any money toward the city of Asheville’s controversial planned purchase of a Ramada Inn for a low-barrier homeless shelter.
